


A Remote Transmission

by Ununnilium



Category: Faction Paradox - Various Authors
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-08
Updated: 2016-02-08
Packaged: 2018-05-19 01:11:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5950495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ununnilium/pseuds/Ununnilium
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A messenger of the Remote comes to Faction Paradox with a message they don't want to hear...</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Remote Transmission

Bella Shadowstar Windblade Magnanimous Goodkisser Aethereal Byron, Lady of Chaos, Scourge of the Rim, Fifth Level Adeptus of the Fourth Wall, and Paladin of the Remote, stepped through the threshold of London Bridge and into the Eleven Day Empire.

Her names and titles glittered in the weave of her imaginary armor. The likes and comments she'd accumulated glowed softly in the two-lobed symbol of her heart. In her left ear was Firebringer, the transmitter; and in her right was Hornshold, the reciever. Between them was her head, which carried the Message.

From the moment she stepped into the unspace she was under assault. Signals were seething out of the very architecture, signals that would overwhelm those who thoughtlessly absorbed or thoughtlessly resisted. But the nature of the Remote was to engage with media, to break it down, analyze it, and make it theirs. She understood the signals, understood the ones who sent them, and the understanding simply reinforced the Message.

There was a fluttering. Feathery voids made their way across the sky, landing around her, tilting their heads and staring into her timeline. The Unkindnesses had noticed the new type of being, shining rainbow-colored in the sepia dusk of the Empire, and flown all the way from Tower Hill to see. Their curiosity was sharp and pitiless, but she reached into her pocket and pulled out a handful of what ifs and elseworlds, scattering them on the cobblestones. The Unkindnesses turned, sussurating round, pecking at the seeds of alternity.

Down she went, down the unstreets and unalleys, steps quiet and sure on the symbolic firmament. Walking through the idea of London, one could always see Westminster Palace, and Big Ben, and the Houses of Parliament; and the last of these was her goal.

The streets were sparse, and populated primarily by ghosts and ravens; but she could see two forms, wearing anachronistic three-piece suits embroidered with ritualistic iconography, accessorized with masks made of huge, batlike skulls. The Faction's own bodyguards (they would never stoop to something as unironically romanticized as "knights"), come to bar her path to Parliament. That's politics!

She giggled at her own joke, then stood her ground, drawing the legendary blade Laser Excalibur.

They came at her with their sombras que cortan, shadow-cutting swords, only to find that her own shadow was ready and armed, deflecting their blades with a dagger stolen from Peter Pan and smacking their rears with the flat of her existence. She whirled, slicing the blades from their hilts, knocking off their masks, and cutting the letter "R" into the backs of their suits. The medium was the message, and the two enforcers got the drift; they fled, embarrassed, carrying the tattered remains of their ironic distance.

She had to hurry; this place loved schadenfreude, but not more than it loved control, and more bodyguards were coming. In a succession of quick cuts, she placed herself just outside the Parliament, its sheer stone walls that shouted forbearance.

The gate was impassible, but there was more than one way into the seats of government. She pressed her hands to the old-new bricks and _pushed_ , remembering that she herself was a signal, traveling, transmitting herself directly through the stone structure.

Deep within the walls. The signals were strongest, clearest here, like whispery gas leaks resolving on the edge of hearing into words.

>> Faction Paradox is the bastard spawn of transtemporal imperialism, come to commit fratricide on the bourgeoise of eternity. <<

>> Faction Paradox is the revolution of revolutions, the explosion that knocks the building apart, the one true way to build anew. <<

>> Faction Paradox is the grimness of necessity, the sadism of fact, the unpleasant truth acid in the mouths of the pampered and spoiled and weak, and if you don't like us, clearly that's who you are. <<

She did not close her ears; she surfed the waves of hate and rage and passive-aggressiveness, virtual skin crawling, yet steadfast and true.

She rose, like Venus, out of the center of the House of Commons; weapons down, hands out, chin tilted upward, brows furrowed, regard intense. All around her were the black-robed Mothers and Fathers of the faction, stooping, looking down in bewilderment; high above her was the empty chair of the Grandfather. For a moment - a split second - the whispers stopped, and all attention was on her.

Shouting at the top of her lungs, she released the Message:

    "Faction Paradox is a bunch of rich white kids appropriating an interesting foreign culture!"

After that, the fate of Bella Shadowstar Windblade Magnanimous Goodkisser Aethereal Byron passes to myth and legend. Some say the Mothers and Fathers descended on her, tearing her to shreds, tearing each other to shreds in an orgy of rage. Some say the ground itself swallowed her up, the signals of the Empire taking physical form in furious counterargument. Some say that she was imprisoned, and that the message was the beginning of a long and gruelling war as the forces of the Faction fought the champions of the Remote come to take her back; and that she waits for rescue, the war raging still.

The legend that no one tells - at least, not within earshot of any Cousin, and certainly not within the reach of any Godparent - is that she simply walked away; the shock of the message so great that the recovery from it used up a whole Day, though the Empire still claimed eleven. It would be scorned as an exaggeration, the puffing of a braggart; no one would say that such a straightforward and obvious criticism could really be that shocking, or that an organization would cultivate such studied self-importance and self-ignorance that they couldn't handle it.

And surely, if you asked her, as the children of the Remote often do, Bella would be too humble to claim such a victory for herself.

**Author's Note:**

> Readers familiar with Faction Paradox may have noticed that Bella's... Bella-ness implies a very different version of the Remote than we see in Interference or other official media. That's because this is a very different universe - the Helix Politic, based around the three stable points of Gallifrey, Cybertron, and Destron, Cybertron's mysterious moon. That's right, the Triple Helix universe is a Whoniverse/Transformers crossover, created by myself and m'good friend, SorayaProtera (http://archiveofourown.org/users/SorayaProtera). The Remote themselves have a very different origin than the ones in the EDAs and the Faction Paradox books, one that will be revealed whenever we do the big "History of the World" fic. Stay tuned!


End file.
